


New Year, New Bride

by TeamGwenee



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Arranged Marriage, F/M, Human Sacrifice...kind of, Marriage Arranged By Fate, Modern AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:33:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28459074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TeamGwenee/pseuds/TeamGwenee
Summary: Every century, a new Nissa Nissa is offered up to Azor Ahai, god and protector of the realm. But over retellings of the legend have led to some misinterpretations.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 14
Kudos: 93





	New Year, New Bride

The New Year began at the end of the longest night. The night when the sun once more began to battle the darkness and dominate the sky, the days stretching out longer and longer and the earth growing warmer and warmer. Light and flowers and food grew plentiful once more, and the world could rejoice at having emerged from the darkness and cold.

But before such blessings could be enjoyed, a sacrifice had to be made. 

Brienne Tarth was not a lucky girl. She was six foot tall, with lank hair and copious freckles, and teeth that required many years of tedious and expensive dentistry to put straight. At school the girls, boys and teachers alike had mocked her, called her slow, called her ugly. Her teacher, Mrs Roelle snapped and smirked whenever Brienne was called upon to answer a question or stammer through a presentation.

Work was worse. She had hoped to find kindred spirits at the local gym where she taught boxing, but her colleagues loathed having a woman; and such an ugly woman, intrude on their space, and Randyll Tarly her boss had told her straight that if she wanted to work in a ‘man’s world’ she would have to be willing to endure their bullying. They could not be expected to do otherwise.

Of course, Brienne had been unlucky from the moment of her birth. Any girl who had turned twenty one in the year of the millennium was unfortunate, for it was these girls who were eligible for the lottery.

The lottery was annual, and usually to win it was simply to be paraded about in a beautiful dress at the head of the King’s Landing festivities. Ceremonial duties only. It was quite an honour, and one most girls coveted. It was also optional, tickets for entry costing two pounds each.

Once a century, the lotteries were not optional, and the role of Nissa Nissa was not ceremonial.

“There are thousands of girls whose names are in the lottery,” Selwyn Tarth had assured his daughter. “You would have to be monumentally unlucky for your ticket to be called.” 

Alas, Brienne had known since she childhood, that she was monumentally unlucky. And despite her shock at being called, she was not so surprised as she should have been.

~

She went through the ceremonies in a blind daze, allowing herself to be dressed up and paraded about as silent as a wooden doll. She had cried all her tears at the airport, as her father bid his goodbyes before the private jet had come to whisk her away.

Even when they stripped her bare and left her naked and shivering in the sept, the echoes of celebration and song drifting from the city streets, she could not fathom what was happening to her. She was twenty one, alive and fit. She should have had her entire life ahead of her. And yet here she was, bound to an altar and awaiting the cold bite of steel between her breasts, and then an eternity of nothing.

  
“So, this is my new bride?” 

Brienne’s heart began pounding violently against her ribs, as footsteps echoed towards her. Azor Ahai took his time approaching, paying no heed to the discomfort and fear of the poor girl laying helplessly before him.

He stood over her, and Brienne had no choice but to gasp. Bathed in golden candlelight, stoo the most handsome man she had ever seen. Indeed, he was more god than man. His fingers danced across the coarse rope tying her in place.

“Seems a bit excessive,” he mused, “Let’s get you out.”

Brienne flinched as he reached for his scabbard, but it was a dagger he brought out, not a sword.

“That is not Lightbringer,” she mumbled, as her bounds came loose. Shivering, she curled in on herself, conscious of her nakedness. Azor Ahai, half hidden in shadows, half glowing in the light, seemed less bashful of his nudity. “Lightbringer is a sword.”

“Things do get lost in translation over the years,” he noted, resting beside her on the altar. “For instance, Azor Ahai was just a title. My real name is Jaime.”

“Jaime?” Brienne repeated, some feeling returning to her numb fingers. “Why...why did you cut me loose?” She could not allow herself to hope, it would be too cruel for life to be snatched away from her once more. Although, shooting him a quick look, Brienne thought she could overpower him, if she took him by surprised. ‘No,’ she rebuked herself, ‘there is more at stake here than your own skin. Whatever is asked of you, you will do so nobly.’

“I prefer my bride come willingly to me,” he drawled, “Even back in my day, bride stealing was a thing for savages. Though I struggle to see how that is better than selling off twelve year olds to old men. That is why I prefer twenty one.” 

“What girl willingly comes to be stabbed?” Brienne asked curtly. “If the world did not depend on-”

“Becoming my wife,” Jaime said gently. “And nothing more. It is a hard task guarding the realms of men from the darkness. I need someone by my side, someone noble and strong.”

“But the legend,” Brienne spluttered, “The sword. In the legend, Azor Ahai  _ stabs _ Nissa Nissa with his sword.” 

Jaime grimaced. “Ah yes,” he drawled, “My sword. Metaphors really do not translate well over the centuries, do they?” 


End file.
